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After a while there came to my knowledge the existence of another division, a region intermediate between Polotzk and Russia. It seemed there was a place called Vitebsk, and one called Vilna, and Riga, and some others. From those places came photographs of uncles and cousins one had never seen, and letters, and sometimes the uncles themselves.
My second journey to Vitebsk, in the company of Uncle Solomon, I remember as well as the first. I had been up all night, dancing at a wedding, and had gone home only to pick up my small bundle and be picked up, in turn, by my uncle. I was a little taller now, and had my own ticket, like a real traveller.
Alas! my backsliding had cost me no travail of spirit. Always weak in my faith, playing at sanctity as I played at soldiers, just as I was in the mood or not, I had neglected my books of devotion and given myself up to profane literature at the first opportunity, in Vitebsk; and I never took up my prayer book again.
The Dvina, and the railroad, went on beyond Vitebsk, went on to Russia. Then was Russia more Polotzk? Was here also no dividing fence? How I wanted to see Russia! But very few people went there. When people went to Russia it was a sign of trouble; either they could not make a living at home, or they were drafted for the army, or they had a lawsuit. No, nobody went to Russia for pleasure.
Then there came a time when I knew that Polotzk and Vitebsk and Vilna and some other places were grouped together as the "Pale of Settlement," and within this area the Czar commanded me to stay, with my father and mother and friends, and all other people like us. We must not be found outside the Pale, because we were Jews. So there was a fence around Polotzk, after all.
"It had been," said the gentleman who narrated the incident, "a severe winter in Vitebsk and Vilna. I had spent several weeks at the country residence of a friend in Vitebsk, and we heard, during the latter part of my stay, rumors of the unusual ferocity of the wolves. "One day Kanchin, my host, proposed a wolf-hunt.
The men of this party had both the quality and the defect of frankness in their opinions. They feared Napoleon, recognized his strength and their own weakness, and frankly said so. They said: "Nothing but sorrow, shame, and ruin will come of all this! We have abandoned Vilna and Vitebsk and shall abandon Drissa.
Success and Failure The Struggle with Summer Heat Napoleon at Vitebsk The Russians Over-confident The Fight at Smolensk Technical Victory and Real Defeat Napoleon's Fatal Decision The Russians at Borodino The Battle Array Napoleon's Victory Russian Efforts to Burn Moscow.
Under Rabbi Zalman the townlets of Lozno and Ladi served as "capitals"; under his successors, they were Ladi and Lubavichi. The three localities are all situated on the border-line of the governments of Vitebsk and Moghilev, in which the Hasidim of the Habad persuasion formed either a majority, as was the case in the former government, or a substantial minority, as was the case in the latter.
Before Rostov had had time to consider and determine the distance of that firing, Count Ostermann-Tolstoy's adjutant came galloping from Vitebsk with orders to advance at a trot along the road. The squadron overtook and passed the infantry and the battery which had also quickened their pace rode down a hill, and passing through an empty and deserted village again ascended.
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